The experiment with the “behavior modification” dorm at Donaldson CF in Alabama continues. Hearkening back to the Tuskegee Experiment and other forms of medical torture that have taken place in Alabama against predominately African Americans, the Alabama prison system is again violating basic civil and human rights in the name of corrections by conducting a “behavior modification” experimental program and using over 80% African American men, including many who don’t have any behavior problems.

Over the past two weeks, the Alabama Department of Corrections has been going to other lower level prisons around the State and snatching up African American men and transferring them to Donaldson CF and placing them into a new experimental program called the “behavior modification” program. The first problem is, most — if not all — of these African American men came from general population at other prisons with no behavior records warranting their transfer.

Once in this program, all of their rights and privileges are curtailed. Among the most egregious violations has been the denial of showers for six consecutive days and counting, no personal or legal property, denial of all mail, books, and reading material, no visitation with family, and no paperwork or written explanation explaining why they are being placed into a “behavior modification” program; all while housed two to a cell.

Many of these men have such exemplary records that they qualified for an incentive package at their former prison, only to arrive at Donaldson to have their packages taken from them. In order to qualify for an incentive package, one must have 6 months disciplinary free records for non-violent rules violations and 1 year disciplinary free for violent disciplinary. Some of these men have multiple years of disciplinary free records, while others have never have any prior violent records.

They are forced to eat, sleep, defecate, and urinate with another person in the cell at all times. These cells don’t have a table to eat on, and if one or the other cellmates is defecating when a meal is being served, both of their trays are passed into the cell anyway. And, because they are being denied recreation time, they are locked down 24 hours every day in a two-man cell. Also of note is that the ADOC elected to start this experimental program in the heat of the Summer.

Again, the majority of these men, came from the general population at other prisons. Most of them have disciplinary free files, yet they are beingplaced into a behavior modification program. Some of them have level 4 custody for a medium security prison, yet they were transferred to a level 6 maximum security prison, which is the highest level prison in Alabama, and placed on total lockdown.

In fact, these men were placed into this experimental program before a S.O.P. manual was complete on how this program would be ran or what the criteria would be to place someone in this program.

If the majority of these African American men don’t have any disciplinary records to justify their placement into this program, and all of them came from general population at other lower level prisons and have lower custody classification status, why are they being placed into this experimental “behavior modification” program? The answer seems quite simple: because this racist experimental programs was designed to be tested on and carried out disproportionately against African American men.

This is the same model that was used in the Georgia prison system.

The Georgia Department of Corrections hired a retired military officer to run their prison system, and he began a “behavior modification ” program that employs these same enhanced torture tactics that were first tested and used by the US military in Abu Gharib prison in Iraq. Alabama has now followed suit by hiring a retired military officer to run the Alabama Department of Corrections, and the new Commissioner is now implementing the exact same “behavior modification” program in Alabama. Georgia tested their program on mostly African American men also.

Please help us bring awareness to this racist and illegal experimental program at Donaldson CF and protest against its continuous by doing the following:

1) Join our media campaign to help expose this program and the fact that African Amwrican men in Alabama prisons are being targeted and placed into an experimental psychological torture “behavior program” even though the vast majority of them don’t have any behavior citations.

2) Contact Commissioner Jeff Dunn, Sen. Cam Ward, Governor Robert Bentley and the Civil Rights Division of the US Dept of Justice, and file a complaint and demand to know why this experimental program is being carried out exclusively against African American men.

3) Join FREE ALABAMA MOVEMENT, MOTHERS AND FAMILIES, THE ORDINARY PEOPLE SOCIETY, and IWOC as we plan to organize protests at Donaldson CF against this racist and illegal experimental program.

4) Contact the Alabama Board of Medical Examiners and file a complaint against any medical/psychology professional for engaging in experimental psychological practices and mental torture against African American men incarcerated at Donaldson prison.

(Springville, Ala.) – Demanding an end to the filthy living conditions on Alabama’s death row and “a culture of violence” carried out by officials throughout the state’s maximum security prisons, families and friends of the men, women and children who are incarcerated in Alabama prisons will hold a peaceful protest on Sunday, Feb. 1.

Sponsored by the Free Alabama Movement (FAM), the protest will begin at 11:30 a.m.in front of the St. Clair Correctional Facility (SCCF), located at 1000 St. Clair Road in Springville.

FAM was started by men in Alabama state prisons to expose “the deplorable conditions and the slave labor inside the cement walls” of the state’s prisons. FAM has posted videos on You Tube in which over 80 men who are incarcerated in the Alabama Department of Corrections give their personal accounts about the inhumane living conditions they endure in Alabama prisons.

Three Alabama maximum security prisons, St. Clair CF, Holman Correctional Facility, and Donaldson Correctional Facility, all went on lockdown at some point in the past 10 days due to violent-related incidents.

Men and women are confined to their 8 by 12 foot cells 24 hours a day during lockdowns, and their family members
and friends cannot visit them.

On Jan. 25, several men on death row at Holman held a peaceful protest. Holman officials have denied these men use of equipment to clean their cells, and these men are being forced to eat cold sack lunches three times
a day. “We are human beings. Just because we’re on death row doesn’t mean that we have to live like animals,” said one death row inmate. The guards used pepper spray to punish the peaceful protesters in the segregation unit at Holman who were also protesting the inhumane living conditions.

SCCF has turned into one of the most dangerous prisons in America, according to the FAM. The prison’s warden, Carter Davenport was previously suspended in 2012 for assaulting a man confined at St. Clair in the head while he was handcuffed.

Riot police have been called in at SCCF, according to FAM. In the last two weeks, there have been at least 20 incidents in which people were stabbed or assaulted by an officer, at SCCF. Prisoner Jarvis “Flame” Jenkins was beaten twice by guards and was seen with blood dripping from his clothes. Another SCCF prisoner, Derrick LaKeith Brown, has been hospitalized with injuries for a week.

Prison officials Warden Walter Myers and Captain Darryl Fails, and others, removed James Pleasant from his cell at Holman on January 23, 2015, and told him that he, Robert E. Council (Holman) and Melvin Ray (St. Clair), known as the FAM 3, were problems to the ADOC and threatened to kill them for exposing inhumane and illegal conditions inside Alabama prisons.

FAM has been organizing Non-Violent and Peaceful Protests throughout the ADOC since January 1, 2015, when over a three week perios, over 4500 men participated in the demonstrated, which were supported by their families, friends, loved ones, and supporters nationwide.

For more information, call Ann Brooks at (256)783-1044.

UPDATED: On January 27, 2015, St. Clair CF went back on lockdown, where the overcrowding and lack of leadership from Warden Carter Davenport continues to cause a violent atmosphere.

MS Southern Belles

Come be a part of an Amazing Journey, help us bring empowerment to the incarcerated & their families: Mississippi Southern Belles, P.O. Box 442, Jackson, MS 39205, mississippisouthernbelles@gmail.com, (601) 345-1674

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